Mahmood Ahmad
|
2nd npower Test: England v Pakistan at Manchester, 31 May - 4 Jun 2001 Mahmood Ahmad |
|
|
England 2nd innings:
|
The 9th wicket pair added 31 runs in 9.5 overs, and the way they were playing it seemed Pakistan would have to swallow another bitter pill of a series defeat.
Gough was particularly looked in good nick. Not overawed by the tautness of the situation he executed a string of lovely boundaries especially against Waqar, clearly frustrating the skipper.
While Gough was content in facing Waqar’s pace, his partner seemed happy negotiating the off spins of Saqlain. Yet it was his very defensive approach that led to his demise. Offering pad to a quicker delivery from Saqlain, he was adjudged lbw for 4, having faced 33 balls.
Hoggard was dropped at silly point on the last ball, the only he faced. Waqar came in from the other end and the very first ball from him, seemingly a loose one outside off, was sliced to covers, where Imran Nazir, the 12th man, picked up a brilliant catch.
England were all out for 261 in 105.1 overs of their second innings.
Saqlain returned excellent figures of 4 for 74 in 47 overs, of which 20 were maidens. Waqar finished with three for 85 and Wasim took 2 for 59.
Inzamam-ul-Haq was awarded the man of the match for his excellent effort with the bat, getting 199 in the two innings. He was also declared the man of the series for Pakistan. Graham Thorpe was the man of the series for the home side.
It all started when Waqar took the new ball. Saqlain bowled the first over after tea, giving away just one run. Waqar went for the new ball immediately after that and handed it over to Wasim Akram.
A boundary by Trescothick in that over brought up the 200 of England innings. One more run after that and Pakistan got their third wicket.
The new ball had necessitated that Waqar should be coming on with Wasim at the other end. And it was only the second ball from the skipper that undid Thorpe’s defenses, taking the off stump out of the ground.
Trescothick departed in the very next over, by Wasim. The left-hander had added five to his tea score of 112 when trying to turn a short one from Wasim to leg, he offered a catch to Rashid behind the stumps on the leg side.
Trescothick got 117 off 272 balls and hit 15 fours and a six, with the wicket falling at 213 in the 86th over.
Stewart and Ian Ward took the score to 229 and then the real collapse started. Saqlain trapped the skipper lbw for 19 – an easy decision for Shepherd this time as the batsman padded the one coming straight in.
Nick Knight went for a first-ball duck off Wasim. The left-hander was a bit unlucky as action replays clearly showed that Wasim had overstepped on that occasion.
The next over, bowled by Saqlain, brought two more scalps. After having Ward caught at the wicket, he tried Caddick with a ‘wrong-un’, which knocked the off-stump out of the ground, thus, bringing Pakistan supporters to their feet.
Cork and Gough are now at the crease and trying hard to see through the remaining 14 overs. It would not be an easy task though, as Pakistan attack is sensing victory and it won’t let them run away too easily.
After 7 overs of industrious bowling, Waqar replaced himself with Razzaq and the events took a slightly new turn.
First, it was the arrival of Trescothick’s century, his first on home ground and second overall in test cricket. It was a maturely drafted innings from the left-hander, considering England had started their innings under pressure of 370 runs. Yet he played with confidence, taking 218 balls and hitting 18 fours and a six to reach the landmark.
Trescothick was still on 100 when he got a big reprieve by umpire Shepherd. It was a drifter from Saqlain that took the inside edge of the bat, hit the pad and went into the hand of a diving Youhana at short leg. However, Shepherd remained totally unmoved despite Saqlain’s pleadings.
The next over, by Razzaq, however brought the much-needed break for Pakistan. The young all-rounder threw in an out-swinger to find the outside edge of Vaughan’s bat, before it went into the safe hands of Rashid behind the stumps.
The first innings’ century-maker could get 14 this time around after staying for as long as 62 balls at the crease.
The Pakistan skipper employed a circle of close-in fielders around Thorpe, the new comer, when Saqlain was in operation but the experienced campaigner proved equal to the task, facing the off-spinner without much ado.
After safely seeing through the tense 20 or so minutes after Vaughan’s dismissal, both Treschothick and Thorpe executed some lovely drives and pulls to either side of the wickets, taking England to 196 for 2 by tea.
At tea, Trescothick has advanced to 112 (259 balls), whereas Thorpe has just moved into the double figures after dispatching Razzaq, bowling the last over before the interval, through covers for his second boundary.
England reached 150 immediately after the break, when Vaughan punched Waqar into covers for a double. This was followed by a four by Trescothick off Saqlain, taking the batsman into the 90’s.
Thereafter, it was an extremely slow going for them, with the seven overs after lunch producing only 10 runs and the following four turning out to be maidens. This also included the one over which Waqar bowled to Vaughan, and it was simply superb.
After beating him on a couple of occasions outside off, the Pakistani skipper did at last succeed in finding the outside edge of the bat, only to see the ball falling inches short of Rashid’s gloves.
However, the next over by the skipper proved an anticlimax. Swaying outside off he yielded a double to covers and then drifted one down the leg to be glanced for a four, the first, by Vaughan.
Waqar has bowled 7 excellent but unsuccessful overs after lunch, giving away 17 runs.
And the most frustrated of them would be not other than the Pakistan captain. Replacing Wasim just at the hour in the morning, he tried virtually everything to shake the batsmen’s confidence. If his bouncers and short ones were left untouched, his yorkers were dug out and in-cutters well defended.
However, it is not wrongly said that hard work always pays. It did pay this time as well.
Atherton had just moved on to his 44th Test fifty (118 balls, 8 fours) when Pakistan captain unleashed a perfect in-swinger, one of the many he had been trying since morning, that took the middle stump, bringing about a rare wave of delight in the Pakistani portions of the crowd.
The former England captain scored 51, with the wicket falling at 146.
Trescothick, on the other hand, has been as solid as ever, never offering any chance whatsoever to the bowlers, despite being considerably troubled by Saqlain early on. He is well on his to a magnificent hundred, having already made 88 off 170 ball, which contain 11 fours and a six.
Michael Vaughan, coming to the crease after Atherton’s dismissal, withstood some tense moments in the middle, before getting off the mark after Afridi, the 12th man, misfielded at point.
The last innings’ centurion is batting on 1 off 12, with England having moved on to 149 by lunch on the last day of this absorbing test match.
Waqar the only successful bowler has bowled 7 overs in his second spell, taking one wicket for 21.
England started the proceedings in a circumspect manner, adding just 11 in 9 overs during the first half-an-hour. With Saqlain finding considerable turn while operating round the wicket to the left-hander, the scoring was always going to be difficult.
Still, with only two runs required to reach his fifty, Trescothick worked a Saqlain delivery to third man to get two. He took 81 balls to reach the milestone and hit 7 fours.
It was Trescothick’s bat which brought the first boundary of the morning in the 10th over, tucking Wasim awat to deep square leg. This shot also brought up the hundred of the partnership in the 32nd over. Thereafter, the left-hander grew in confidence, getting one more boundary of Wasim in his next over, and finding one’s and two’s with comparative ease, also inspiring his partner to work the ball into the gaps.
Wasim bowled 7 overs from the Stretford End for 19 runs, before being replaced by the skipper himself. Waqar bowled well, beating Atherton a couple of times outside the off stump, yet the experienced opener kept his cool, avoiding any undue risk.
© CricInfo
Date-stamped : 04 Jun2001 - 22:25